Kirk's Gonna Fly
by Gaia'schild
Summary: 'Kirk has always been obsessed with flying, ever since he was a young boy. And someday he was going to explore the stars, with or without Starfleet.' Short flicks of Kirk's life based around the song 'I'm Gonna Fly' from Kiki's Delivery Service. Language warning for adult Kirk chapters.
1. From the Porch

_And my feet can't stay on the ground any longer_

_With every leap of faith I feel a little stronger_

_Wanna swing from a star in the big blue sky_

_Don't wanna watch it all go by_

_So I'm gonna fly_

James Kirk loved flying. Loved the feel of wind sweeping through his hair. Loved the way it felt like freedom. What he hated most was the fall

When he was younger, he used to climb to the top of the porch railing and jump out into the hydrangea bush that his mother had planted there in an attempt to cover the peeling paint. He would stand up straight with his arms straight out from his shoulders and head thrown back. There he would stand, waiting for the perfect moment and the voice in the back of his head that would whisper 'jump.'

He would push off from the railing and fly, higher than the house, the Earth, up to the space station. Up to the stars. And then he would fall into the bush. But that blissful moment, that moment where he was weightless was more precious than all the photographs and all the stuffed toys in his room. James imagined that that was the reason that his father had gone into space. So he could fly.

So what if it scared George when he caught Jim jumping into the bush, he didn't understand James's need to feel free. George got to go out and play with his friends, James had none.

So what if it ruined his clothes, made huge holes in his shirts and plants. They were all hand-me-downs from George, hardly new or expensive. And he wasn't likely to have a younger brother; George had told him that so he knew it was true.

And it wasn't like his mother would notice. She spent every waking moment at work trying to do something. James had a feeling that he had somehow done something wrong and she was punishing him for it. He had tried apologizing to her, but she still kept going to work before he woke up and came back right when he was going to bed.

The nanny cared, but he was sure that it was because she had to take care of the laundry.

Nobody really cared; nobody really understood his need to fly. But that was okay by him; that meant that he didn't have to share that moment of pure freedom with anyone else. He would have shared it with George, he might have liked it too, but when George had yelled at him for jumping James had decided not to tell him. He was too old to understand.

So James kept his love of flying to himself and stole away those moments when his mother wasn't home and George was with friends and the nanny wasn't home to jump off anything he could, just so that he could feel that freedom. And at night, he stared up at the sky and wondered if someday he might fly up there, with his father.


	2. Taste the Stardust

_And see for myself what if looks like from up there_

_And taste the stardust in my mouth_

_Chase the clouds until they disappear_

It wasn't until Vulcan had been destroyed and Nero's ship sucked into the black hole and the Enterprise escaping that Jim was able to enjoy where he was. With the warp engines ejected and the rest of the fleet decimated, the Enterprise was looking at a six week journey back to Star Command unless someone came by. He would have looked to the Vulcans to save them, but they were a broken race, unable to help anyone not even themselves.

Cpt Pike was still being held in the Med Bay while Bones did his magic. Jim was amazed to find out that Pike should not have been alive, let alone fire a phaser, when they found him. The nerve damage and internal laceration should have levelled him at least, killed him at the most. Pike would be out of commission for the rest of the voyage as Bones tried to stabilize and regrow proper nerves. He was looking forward to a long journey of physical therapy and medication.

He had taken over the ship on the advice, almost command, of the older Spock in order to save the Federation and the Enterprise. But now that the battle was over and the adrenaline was wearing off, he began to realize how over his head he had landed. Spock had at least spent a long time in the academy and had been aboard a starship or two in his life, but he was trying to cope with the loss of his mother and his planet. Jim could go to him for some help, but it left the day to day running of the ship to him. It was a task better suited to other men, but he was trying.

The first thing on the agenda had been discovering how many of the crew, his fellow classmates, were dead. The list was longer than he had imagined. He wanted to tell those families now, let them properly morn, but there was a ship to save first. Nero's ship had had higher powered weaponry on-board. Scotty had given him a prognosis of Engineering and it hadn't been pretty.

"With aot the engines, Ah cannae get us home in a few days. Its gonna take at least some time. Ah hafta make all the parts from the damned replicators. And they dinnae have the raw materials. Captain, she in a sorry state, but Ah kin we can stumble home."

Engineering wasn't the only part of the ship destroyed, but maybe the most important to them getting home. Transporter bay 1 had a cracked landing pad where Sulu and he had fallen after being transported right before their landing. Decks six through ten all had hull breaches, but those could be contained with _breech heads_ covering the openings. Decks eleven, twelve and thirteen had lost hull integrity. Jim wasn't sure they could survive warp even if they had the engines. To him it felt like the ship was one stiff breeze away from falling apart.

Through all the problems and all the deaths, Jim still felt elation. He was flying, he was captain of the flag ship of the Federation. Even if it only lasted for those six weeks, at least he would have those memories. He was the third person to ever sit in that seat, he could easily pretend his was the first because the seat wasn't even broken in. And sitting on the bridge of the Enterprise with his crew around him, looking out of the viewing screen, he felt alive. He was honest to gods flying.


	3. Dare the Universe

_One day, the whole world looks like an open page_

_and you've been dancing as fast as you can with a smile on your face_

"I dare you to do better."

Kirk watched as the asshole of a Starfleet Captain left the bar where he was supposed to have fun, but didn't count on the jacked-up cadets being let out of their cages that night. Not that he minded, that Uhura girl looked Fine. He had hoped for a one-nighter before they left for San Fran and the Academy in the morning, but Cupcake had to butt in. The bar fight wasn't the worst one he had been in, and he would have walked away from it if there had been one or two less cadets and more space. Life's not fair and shit like that.

The only good that the asshole Captain had done was stopping Cupcake from breaking his face in anymore. If he showed up to work with more bruises, he was damn sure that his boss was gonna kick him to the curb without a care. 'Plenty of other people want this job,' he would squeak, 'and they might just not lose us our customers!'

But then the Captain had started on about him being 'his father's son' and how 'he could do better.' And maybe he liked being the only genius level delinquent in the Midwest; it meant that for once in his life people knew him for being James T. Kirk, not the son of George Kirk. It was why he left home. He was tired of Winnoa looking at him and calling him George.

"I dare you to do better."

Teachers had challenged him to score better on his tests to prove he was the smartest, and others had dared him to show off his _less than_ morally straight skills. But no one ever had dared him to do better than his father. To Earth and Starfleet, you just simply couldn't do better than the great and illustrious Captain George Kirk, hero of the Kelvin and saviour of the bloody universe, if you believed Starfleet propaganda. And hellfire and brimstone would rain down upon you if you even suggested differently. That was part of his problem. Everyone else saw a man who saved 800 people on the Kelvin; Kirk saw a man you abandoned him before he was born to a mother who couldn't look at him and a step-father who was just plain mean.

To do better than his father, to be known for his accomplishments first and foremost. That's what he wanted. He was damn tired of fixing broken shit that the cadets brought in, all the hovercrafts and bikes that they used and abused. And he was beyond damn tired of bowing down to little shits like Cupcake and his posse who believed that if you weren't part of Starfleet, you weren't worth the ground you walked on.

He would do better than this Podunk town in Nowhereville Iowa, if only to show the memory of his father that he was better and to hell with living in the shadow he created from the grave. He was going to do things, explore the stars, and captain a starship. He was gonna fly where ever he wanted to, and his feet would never have to touch the ground again. Forget those damn ideas of being his father's son. He was James T. Kirk, and he was going to break all the limits and rules so people knew who he was.

"Four years? I'll do it in three."

And he did.


End file.
